161–170 of 962 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mozilla uses AFL, which is a genetic algorithm that tests code paths. They are also transitioning to Rust, which will give them a much bigger safety guarantee over most of their code and a much smaller audit surface for the rest.
Rust has nothing to do with QA things since most bug are business logic / UI / UX related. QA don't test for those kind of errors.
Not sure of Mozilla’s financial or organizational structure but it seems to be part of a larger trend of de-emphasizing QA departments at software shops large and small over the past 10 or so years. In many ways test automation tooling has become much easier to use, develop, and manage. But I suspect the larger driving force is that it’s (arguably) a cost center for an org. The burden of ensuring software quality can…
Mozilla uses AFL, which is a genetic algorithm that tests code paths. They are also transitioning to Rust, which will give them a much bigger safety guarantee over most of their code and a much smaller audit surface for the rest.
A fuzzer is not going to replace unit tests or good SDLC, which often involves QA.
This raises the question of what products Mozilla plans to make that will generate revenue. The article doesn't address this.
I found these after a quick search, all of which appear to depend on Firefox to some extent:
- VPN/password manager called Lockvise
- Pocket recommendations and sponsored content
- Firefox Monitor, "a free service which allows people to check whether their email address has been a part of a recent security breach"
- "DNS over HTTPS" and "Encrypted Server Name Indication", "... both of which we’ve partnered with Cloudflare to test in the U.S. market."
in 2018, mozilla had 368 million USD in assets: 2018 financials: https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2018/mozilla-fdn-201... wow, 2.5 million for the executive chair of Mozilla in 2018. is that person really bringing 2.5 millions dollar worth of value to the company. this is in addition to the 2.x million from the year before. 10s of million exfiltrated out of a non-profit by one person over the last few years. n…
> is that person really bringing 2.5 millions dollar worth of value to the company. Probably not but that is what the market cost is. I have no doubt the executive chair of Mozilla has other offers.
Is it really? The average pay for the CEO of a company of Mozilla's size is somewhere around $800,000 according to [1]. And a pretty large chunk of that is performance related.
Of course salaries may vary a lot between industries, but given Mozilla's performance, their CEO's salary appears to be on the high side.
[1] https://chiefexecutive.net/ceo-and-senior-executive-compensa...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder if it's improvements in automation or if QA responsibilities are increasingly rolling up into standard developer roles or because the line between QA and dev is blurring (e.g., software testing now requires stronger dev/automation skills so the QA job looks more like standard software engineering)?
I don't think automation or shift of testing responsibilities to developers is harming QA role in any way, it's just the first candidate for layoffs, because it does not have immediate impact on business. Independent SQA is still relevant, even it it becomes a developer specialization.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
How big do you think a "productive browser team" needs to be? How big do you think the Chromium team is?
> How big do you think a "productive browser team" needs to be? I'd say 50 or so people would be fine. > How big do you think the Chromium team is? Around 60-80 people judging from the names listed under the various Blink teams (Rendering, DOM, Memory, Style, etc).
With 50 or so devs (let's forget for this example about managers, UX researchers and designers, HR, etc.) you'll get maybe a JavaScript VM and a small UX.
Not nearly a browser :(
> Around 60-80 people judging from the names listed under the various Blink teams (Rendering, DOM, Memory, Style, etc).
That sounds like a really, really vast underestimation. To the best of my recollection Chromium embedding teams inside Google that are 30+ developers (again, let's forget managers, UX researchers, etc.). I know that there are at least 4 such teams at Google.
I would be very surprised if Google didn't have at least 1000 developers working on Chromium.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nowadays, a small team is simply not enough to develop a browser and keep up with the competition. Unless you fork Chrome, of course.
They made $450m in revenue in 2018. What fraction of that is actually needed to keep a productive browser team afloat?
in 2018, mozilla had 368 million USD in assets: 2018 financials: https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2018/mozilla-fdn-201... wow, 2.5 million for the executive chair of Mozilla in 2018. is that person really bringing 2.5 millions dollar worth of value to the company. this is in addition to the 2.x million from the year before. 10s of million exfiltrated out of a non-profit by one person over the last few years. n…
I mean, Mozilla brings in $450 million a year in revenue and manages $600 million worth of assets. If she's able to increased the revenue or efficiency by just 1% then she's paid off almost twice her salary. edit: Fixed pronoun, apologies.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> is that person really bringing 2.5 millions dollar worth of value to the company. Probably not but that is what the market cost is. I have no doubt the executive chair of Mozilla has other offers.
I disagree. The CEO seems to be hinting at lean years ahead. She should be cutting her pay instead. Like Nintendo's management did during their Wii U years.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Remember the PR disaster they had when they bundled Pocket?
Well, yeah, but focusing on earning does not mean they should start doing stupid things like that or adding a banner place to the start page. For instance, I would have considered paying for some premium features like additional privacy-related functionality or a VPN.